Absence of Facebook Deprives Americans of How They Get News: From One Another!

From Central City News… Surveys have shown that most people get their news online, especially from social media. In other words, they get their news from other Americans.   It is actually ordinary Americans informing one another about what is happening.  That source is now down.

From EpochTimes…

“We’re aware that some people are having trouble accessing our apps and products,” Facebook wrote on Twitter at around 12:30 p.m. New York time. “We’re working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologize for any inconvenience.”

Twitter, YouTube, iMessage, Signal, and other popular services not operated by Facebook were still working as of noon on Oct. 4.

The Epoch Times has contacted Facebook for comment.

In afternoon trading, Facebook shares were down by about 5.3 percent.

In March 2019, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram were down for more than 24 hours worldwide in one of the longest outages the company has faced in years.

The outage on Oct. 4 comes as two members of the European Parliament called for an investigation into allegations by a whistleblower that Facebook prioritized profits above the public good.

The whistleblower, Frances Haugen, who had worked as a product manager on the civic misinformation team at Facebook, shared internal documents with newspapers and attorneys general from several U.S. states. Haugen will testify in front of the Senate on Oct. 6.

“The Facebook Files—and the revelations that the whistleblower has presented to us—underscores just how important it is that we do not let the large tech companies regulate themselves,” said Danish lawmaker Christel Schaldemose.

“The documents finally put all the facts on the table to allow us to adopt a stronger Digital Services Act,” Alexandra Geese, a German lawmaker at the European Parliament, said. “We need to regulate the whole system and the business model that favors disinformation and violence over factual content—and enables its rapid dissemination,” she said.

A Facebook spokesperson issued a response to the claims, saying the firm has to make “difficult decisions.”

“Every day, we make difficult decisions on where to draw lines between free expression and harmful speech, privacy, security, and other issues,” the spokesperson said. “But we should not be making these decisions on our own. … We’ve been advocating for updated regulations where democratic governments set industry standards to which we can all adhere.”

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